Which countries have been involved in the war and why?

A surprising advance by Syrian rebels ended Bashar al-Assad’s decades-long rule, with opposition forces taking the capital and forcing the president to flee on 8 December.

The overthrow adopted a 13-year civil warfare, which began after Assad crushed pro-democracy protests, killing greater than half 1,000,000 individuals and displacing tens of millions extra, and embroiled worldwide powers and their proxies.

The world is now watching to see how Syria’s political panorama shapes up after the overthrow of the Assad household’s half-century rule.

These with a vested curiosity within the battle and the way forward for the nation embody, on one aspect, Russia and Iran – which backed Assad – and on the opposite, the US and Turkey, which supported totally different insurgent teams.

Right here we discover how these nations, together with Israel, have performed a task in Syria – and will proceed to take action.

Throughout Syria’s civil warfare, Turkey has supported opposition forces – primarily the Syrian Nationwide Military (SNA) – by offering arms, army and political help.

Syria’s northern neighbour has largely been involved with utilizing rebels to include the Kurdish YPG militia, which Turkey accuses of being an extension of a domestically banned Kurdish insurgent group. Turkey additionally needs the roughly three million Syrian refugees residing in its nation to return house.

The YPG is the largest militia in one other insurgent group, the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance.

Through the warfare, Turkish troops and allied rebels seized stretches of territory from these teams alongside Syria’s northern border.

Turkey has additionally been politically concerned. In 2020, Turkey and Russia brokered a ceasefire to halt a push by the federal government to retake Idlib, the rebels’ stronghold within the north-west.

Idlib has been administered since 2017 beneath a so-called authorities by Islamist militant group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which led the rebels that ultimately overthrew Assad.

Many consider the offensive couldn’t have occurred with out Turkey’s blessing. Turkey has denied backing HTS.

In the meantime, battle in Syria’s north continues: As Assad fell, the SNA launched a separate assault on areas held by the SDF.

Russia already had a decades-long relationship with the Assad authorities, and had army bases there earlier than the civil warfare.

In 2015, Russia launched an air marketing campaign and despatched hundreds of troops in help of the Assad regime.

In return, Russia obtained 49-year leases on an air base and naval base, which supplied essential hubs within the jap Mediterranean for transferring army contractors out and in of Africa.

However combating a warfare in Ukraine since 2022 preoccupied Assad’s ally, contributing to the Syrian army’s swift defeat to insurgent teams in late November and early December.

Assad and his household had been granted asylum in Moscow after fleeing Damascus, Russian media reported.

After Syria’s pro-democracy protests in 2011 had been met with drive, then US-president Barack Obama criticised the Assad authorities – however the US solely grew to become concerned militarily as a way to fight the Islamic State (IS).

A US-led international coalition has carried out air strikes and deployed particular forces since 2014 to assist the Kurdish-led insurgent alliance SDF seize territory as soon as held by IS militants within the north-east.

After the Assad authorities fell, the US authorities mentioned it carried out dozens of air strikes towards IS camps and operatives in central Syria to make sure IS couldn’t benefit from the unstable state of affairs.

Nevertheless, President-elect Donald Trump, who takes workplace in January, mentioned Syria is a “mess” the US ought to keep out of. When Trump was president in 2019, he withdrew US troops from Syria, a transfer his officers regularly rowed again.

The US at present has round 900 troops in Syria.

Iran and Syria have been allies since Iran’s Islamic Revolution in 1979. Syria backed Iran in the course of the Iran-Iraq warfare within the Eighties.

Through the Syrian civil warfare, Iran is believed to have deployed tons of of troops and spent billions of {dollars} to assist Assad.

Hundreds of Shia Muslim fighters armed, educated and financed by Iran – largely from the Lebanon-based Hezbollah motion, but additionally from Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen – have additionally fought alongside the Syrian military.

However just like Russia, Hezbollah has been weakened by battle with Israel in Lebanon, doubtless hastening the downfall of the Syrian army.

Israel shares a border with Syria. Within the 1967 Six-Day Conflict, Israel seized the Golan Heights, about 60km (40 miles) south of Damascus, from Syria, earlier than annexing it in 1981. The annexation will not be recognised by the UN and plenty of different nations.

Israel has carried out air strikes towards Iran-linked targets in Syria in the course of the warfare, though it not often acknowledges such strikes.

Since rebels overthrew Assad, Israel has carried out tons of of assaults throughout Syria. Targets embody Syria’s army infrastructure, naval fleet, and weapons manufacturing websites.

Israel mentioned it’s appearing to cease weapons falling “into the palms of extremists”.

Israeli forces have additionally seized the demilitarised buffer zone within the Golan Heights and should have strayed into close by Syrian territory.

BBC Confirm geolocated a picture of an IDF soldier standing simply over half a kilometre past the buffer zone, inside Syria on a hillside close to the village of Kwdana.